PHI-10 Lecture Notes - Lecture 15: Gary Busey, Haecceity, Nominalism
Document Summary
Ockham is a radical nominalist- just chops down. There are no real, mind-independent universal things (except words, in a derivative way) There is no common nature to be contracted. Thus, there is no need for a principle of individuation. Individual material substances are as they are- they just come that way (de se hoc) Socrates is what he is all by himself- there is no need for an explanation of his individuality. The only real mind-independent unity is numerical unity. Ockham rejects the real less than numerical unity. There is only a real distinction between real things. And the distinction of reason between concepts of things. X is formally distinct from y if and only if x can be conceived without y"s being conceived (or vice versa) T4: the common nature and the haecceity are not really distinct, but are only formally so.
